The first breath of adultery is the freest; after it, constraints aping marriage develop. John Updike More Quotes by John Updike More Quotes From John Updike The fact that we still live well cannot ease the feeling that we no longer live nobly. John Updike easefeelingsfacts Museums and bookstores should feel, I think, like vacant lots - places where the demands on us are our own demands, where the spirit can find exercise in unsupervised play. John Updike exercisemuseumsthinking Man is a means for turning things into spirit and turning spirit into things. John Updike spiritmenmean Our tears fatten upon our memories of joy. John Updike tearsjoymemories You always find things you didn't know you were going to say, and that is the adventure. John Updike knowsadventure I never made a decision in my life that wasn't one hundred per cent selfish. John Updike selfishhundreddecision Celebrity is a mask that eats into the face. As soon as one is aware of being somebody, to be watched and listened to with extra interest, input ceases, and the performer goes blind and deaf in his over-animation. One can either see or be seen. John Updike inputblindfaces The measure of artistic merit is the length to which a writer is willing to go in following his own compulsions. John Updike artisticmeritwriting The moment when the finished book or, better yet, a tightly packed carton of finished books arrives on my doorstep is the moment of truth, of culmination; its bliss lasts as much as five minutes, until the first typographical error or production flaw is noticed. John Updike errorslastsbook The scrape and snap of Keds on loose alley pebbles seems to catapult their voices high into the moist March air blue above the wires. John Updike voiceairblue Days, pale slices between nights, they blend, not exactly alike, transparencies so lightly tinted that only stacked all together do they darken to a fatal shade. John Updike shadetogethernight One does not go to Moscow to get fat. John Updike moscowfatsdoe There is no pleasing New Englanders, my dear, their soil is all rocks and their hearts are bloodless absolutes. John Updike rocksliteratureheart Adversity in immunological doses has its uses; more than that crushes. John Updike crushadversityuse I imagine most of that stuff on the information highway is roadkill anyway. John Updike learningeducationknowledge It seems to me the book has not just aesthetic values - the charming little clothy box of the thing, the smell of the glue, even the print, which has its own beauty. But there's something about the sensation of ink on paper that is in some sense a thing, a phenomenon rather than an epiphenomenon. I can't break the association of electric trash with the computer screen. Words on the screen give the sense of being just another passing electronic wriggle. John Updike smellgivingbook A cynic is a kind of romantic who has aged. John Updike cynickind All those little congruences and arabesques you prepared with such delicate anticipatory pleasure are gobbled up as if by pigs at a pastry cart. John Updike pleasurelittlespigs When I write, I aim in my mind not toward New York but toward a vague spot a little to the east of Kansas. John Updike easternew-yorkwriting irony is a way of having one's cake while appearing to eat it. John Updike ironycakeway
